


Deviation

by bendingsignpost



Series: Tumblr Fic [15]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Stripper/Exotic Dancer, Castiel/Dean Winchester UST, Lapdance, M/M, Research, Scientist Castiel (Supernatural), Stripper Dean Winchester, Strippers & Strip Clubs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-20
Updated: 2019-05-20
Packaged: 2020-03-08 14:25:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18896437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bendingsignpost/pseuds/bendingsignpost
Summary: Openly at a loss, Dean looks back to Dr. Novak. “Okay, why the hell would anyone give you funding to figure out how music enhances horniness?”“Advertising purposes,” Dr. Novak responds flatly.And, okay. Yeah.Dean can’t argue with that.





	Deviation

**Author's Note:**

> Anonymous said:  
> I was going to say bookstore/celebrity AU but then I realized that is literally Notting Hill, so... stripper/scientist?

“The same routines don’t work to different songs, is what I’m saying,” Dean tries to explain. “It’s not just about the rhythm.” 

“They can be edited for length,” Dr. Novak responds, as if this is a reasonable response. 

Feeling an absurd disconnect in the conversation, Dean looks over at the club owner. 

Smiling like a cat with cream, Crowley explains, “I think you’ll find Dr Novak’s—Castiel’s, can I call you Castiel? Castiel’s research grant can help us suit the music to his research parameters.”

Openly at a loss, Dean looks back to Dr. Novak. “Okay, why the fuck would anyone give you funding to figure out how music enhances horniness?”

“Advertising purposes,” Dr. Novak responds flatly.

And, okay. Yeah. 

Dean can’t argue with that. 

  


  


The weird part is keeping his routine the same. Same routine, different songs. Same beats per minute, but different singers, different instruments. Ostensibly, different moods. So there’s a little variation, but even the variation has consistency once taken across the whole week, across the whole month.

A set of routines, a set of songs, a set of outfits. Mix and match.  Space out a month-long schedule to rotate these combinations across weekdays and throughout different times of night. Gauge audience reaction by monetary response and the number of solicitations for private dances. It takes all the spontaneity out of it, but it also means Dean doesn’t have to think so much, all without Crowley hounding him for just going through the motions, however sexy.

The crappy part is, Dean quickly realizes what combos are most effective, unexpected or not. And he can’t act on them. Crowley slides Dean some extra cash now and again, but Dean’s certain he could be taking home far more than that in tips if he was let loose to use what he’s already learned. 

Because even if Dean doesn’t like the music, he can dance the dance. He can make anyone put their money where they want their mouth to be: specifically, in the crack of his ass beneath his g-string. He’s got the smile and the wink. He’s got the rhythm and the body. He’s got a bow-legged stance that, as more than one well-paying admirer has told him, just begs to be spread wider. 

Once Castiel’s done with his study, once Dean no longer needs to write up these little reports over how much cash he’s pulled out of his scant clothes or earned through lap dances, Dean can use all of that “advertising” data and break bank. 

And that won’t be the only good part of Castiel being gone. 

Because the  _infuriating_ part is, Castiel doesn’t watch. 

Oh, technically, he does. Castiel is certainly in the audience, not behind the scenes or anything. But Castiel sits in the crowd and orders his goddamn Shirley Temples and watches the audience instead of the stage, like Dean isn’t busting his ass up there. Like watching a bunch of horny office workers is absolutely fascinating, and Dean’s gleaming, toned body might as well be wallpaper. 

Castiel only pays attention to Dean when Dean’s talking about his take and reporting his so-called “results” of the evening. It’s fucking insulting. Especially after Dean takes a couple breaks to put on a few more layers and sit out in the audience too. 

When Benny goes up, Castiel watches. 

When Uriel goes up, Castiel watches. 

When anyone but Dean goes up, Castiel watches. 

Maybe not in a horny way. Definitely in a studying way. And Castiel still watches the audience too. 

But the point stands. 

It’s only Dean he doesn’t care to look at. 

  


  


Dean takes the only mature and responsible course of action. 

He works his ass off even harder. 

  


  


“I need to talk to you,” Castiel tells Dean one night, the minute Dean returns back stage. Without waiting for a reply, Castiel turns around before Dean can so much as pull his bathrobe on. The idiot does realize he’s alone by the time he gets to the door, and he looks back to Dean with an expression of absolute frustration. 

“What?” Dean demands beneath the pulsing music flooding in from the stage. “You think it’s easy to walk in these heels?”

Castiel looks down, face reddening in embarrassment. “Ah.” 

Dean keeps them on anyway, following Castiel out into the tiny changing room he shares with Benny. One of the small perks of being the star talent, emphasis on small. As Dean walks, the robe flares open below the loose terrycloth knot like the slit in a skirt or dramatic dress, a tactile reminder that it might be nice to do a little drag again. 

Once crammed inside, Castiel gingerly takes Benny’s dressing chair in the futile effort to avoid getting glittered. Dean plops into his own. 

“So?” Dean asks. “What’s so important?”

“You’re throwing off the data,” Castiel tells him flatly, eyes hard and focused on Dean’s face. 

Subtly loosening the knot tying his robe shut, Dean crosses his legs. The black terrycloth parts, revealing a slip of hot pink fabric trimmed in black lace, not to mention the matching black garters. A smattering of glitter covers it all, an unintentional but inevitable addition. Dean bounces his foot, the transparent white plastic of the heel sparkling like glass or a toy diamond. 

“Maybe you didn’t rule out some kind of deviation,” Dean responds. “Growing a client base, for one.”

Still refusing to look away from Dean’s face, Castiel narrows his eyes. “Everyone here has one. You’ve been performing differently.”

As if Castiel would know. 

As if he actually  _watches_. 

“Yeah, it’s called practice,” Dean counters. “Why are you surprised doing the same things over and over is making me good at them?”

There,  _there_ , a tiny flash of weakness in Castiel’s eyes. Then, much too calmly, Castiel asks, “What other causes for deviation can you think of?”

Dean smirks. “I’m all deviant, baby.”

Castiel doesn’t respond beyond a raised eyebrow and the tilt of his head. 

“Actually,” Dean says, and he leans forward. He uncrosses his legs, brushing his toes across one of Castiel’s shins. He plants his legs wide, feet arched in the heels, thighs flexed from the height, his dick restrained more by skill than by cloth. 

Eyes very wide indeed on Dean’s face, Castiel swallows. “Yes, Dean?” he asks, his deep voice maybe creeping deeper. 

“Maybe my client base is growing faster,” Dean reasons slowly, scratching his breastbone with the side of his thumb, “because of the private dances.” 

Castiel nods, less like agreement, more like a snake trapped by its charmer. “That could be... a possibility.”

“Do you want to rule that out?”

“Rule it... out?” Castiel asks, frowning. 

Rolling his shoulders, Dean shrugs out of the bathrobe. It falls back onto his chair as he stands, clad only in glitter, sweat, and lingerie. He towers in his heels, toes squashed and arches hurting, and yet still sexy as hell. Through the closed door behind them, only the steady bass thrum of the music can be heard, a synthetic heartbeat pounding the rhythm of arousal.

“So,” Dean begins, and he takes a single step forward, the single step necessary. His shin presses between Castiel’s knees. 

And then he steps forward again, to the side of the chair. 

And again, to the other side. 

Eyes wide, Castiel leans back. He clasps his hands on his thighs and looks up at Dean with a flush flooding his cheeks. 

“Do you think you could rule it out?” Dean asks, beginning to sway. “If I showed you?”

Castiel swallows. 

With a fluid roll of his hips, abs, and upper body, Dean lowers his mouth next to Castiel’s ear. “You’re a smart guy,” Dean murmurs. “I’m sure you could figure it out.” 

Castiel’s heavy breathing rises beneath that unrelenting pounding of the bass. 

“What do you say, Cas?” Dean goads him, letting the insides of his legs brush against the outsides of Castiel’s as he rocks his hips from side to side.  

“What do I...?”

Hands on the top of Castiel’s chair, framing Castiel’s head and shoulders, Dean pushes back. He arches his spine. He holds his head at just the right angle. He knows how well the lines of his arms funnel the gaze to his chest and lower. 

“Do you want me to show you?” Dean asks, his voice as low and dirty as his tactics. 

With wide eyes and a furtive bobbing of the head, Castiel nods. 

Dean shows him. 

Standing, Dean straddles him and undulates, one hand highlighting his nipples. Bringing one leg up and over, dragging the tip of one heel across Castiel’s thighs—but never nearing his crotch—Dean turns around. He bends, sliding his hands down the sides of his legs until he can reach his ankles, ass raised high but working lower. 

He doesn’t need more than the beat, doesn’t need any applause or whistles when he has hitched breathing and audibly straining self-restraint behind him. Again backing himself up over Castiel’s lap, Dean works his ass, flexing muscle and emulating getting pounded to the beat. 

He turns the tease up, he escalates, he fucking  _provokes_. He waits for the moment Castiel grabs, relishing the moment he can slap Castiel’s hands away. He waits for the dumb, lust-drunk come-on, picking out any of the hundreds of rebuffs he keeps tucked away for the clients who love a good humiliation kink. 

But as Dean gyrates his way into the final stretch, turning back to flex his abs and pecs in Castiel’s face, what he sees doesn’t match up with what he imagines. 

For the first time, Dean falters. 

Castiel’s expression of rapture remains steady. 

Dean slows. 

He stills. 

Distantly, he registers the beat from the stage has changed. New song. 

He clears his throat. “Think you can factor that in?” he asks. 

Castiel blinks a little, and then he blinks a lot. Beneath his ever-present suit jacket, beneath the belt and straining up against his fly, there’s a rather nice bulge. Nothing Dean hasn’t seen before—and bigger—while working here, but still okay. 

It’s the expression, though. 

That’s the real compelling part. 

“Or do you need to see more?” Dean asks, lowering his body. 

Castiel hastily withdraws the hands fisted in the cloth over his thighs, and Dean rests some of his weight on the freshly abandoned territory. 

Closing his eyes tight and turning his face away, Castiel groans. For the first time, maybe the first time ever, he touches Dean, and it’s on Dean’s waist, on the thin strip of lace clinging above his hipbones. It’s the tiniest push. 

“I need you to stop,” Castiel begs in a tone that’s begging for something else. “I can’t- Crowley will kick me out if I- He swore- He saw how I-” And Castiel bites his lip again. 

“He saw what?” Dean asks, not moving. “What, Cas?”

Internally writhing, tension rippling beneath his skin, Castiel risks looking back up at Dean. And it clearly is a risk, Castiel’s intellect visibly warring against a very different kind of curiosity. 

“He saw how I look at you,” Cas replies. 

Dean’s dick throbs. 

His dick and only his dick, just that. Just his heart needing to shove that much blood down there, all in one go. 

“If I’m throwing off your data so bad,” Dean says, piecing together an idea he can’t fully let himself look at, “maybe I shouldn’t be in your study.”

“One more month?” Cas asks. 

“And then?” Dean asks right back, finally letting all of his weight rest across Castiel’s lap. They’re not all the way flush, only close to it, and their clothed cocks try to bridge the tiny gap between them. “You want a dance?”

“I’m not very good at dancing,” Cas says, so rough, so sincere, “but I would still take you, if you wanted.”

It takes Dean a long second to wrap his mind around the other use of the word. “Like... out dancing? At a club or something?”

Cas nods. “Or dinner. A movie. Whatever you want.”

Dean can’t seem to think at all. 

“Whatever you want,” Cas repeats. 

“I want you to watch me.”

Cas turns, somehow, even more red. Still, Cas nods. 

Dean stands. He takes Cas by the hand and pulls him up too. 

Cas looks up at him across all the extra inches of Dean’s highest heels. 

“I, uh. Gotta get changed,” Dean reminds him. 

“Oh,” Cas says. Then: “ _Oh!_  Yes. You. Yes. I’ll... see you out there?”

“You’d better. The whole rest of the month, you’re watching.”

“All right,” Cas agrees. 

  


  


In the end, Cas watches a lot longer than that.

**Author's Note:**

> As always, to see what else I'm working on, you can follow me on [tumblr here](http://bendingsignpost.tumblr.com/) or [dreamwidth here](http://https://bendingsignpost.dreamwidth.org/).


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